In the previous posts we’ve started to look at a simple, but often overlooked process to plan for success, and which we can use to make 2015 our best year (in property) ever.
Because the simple truth is, that unless we start to plan for success in 2015 now, the chances are that most of us will have yet another mediocre year at best.
But it doesn’t have to be that way, if we’d just follow the 5 step process.
Step 2 of the process is to ‘Set goals to achieve what we (really) want to achieve’.
And in the previous post we looked at the first of three things we can do to make sure our goals for 2015 are supercharged and give us the greatest chance of having our best year (in property) ever.
Here are the next three things we need to think about.
Number 4 – Set goals that stretch your comfort zone, and make you feel uncomfortable.
If your goals aren’t so big that they are scaring you, or if they don’t make you feel very uncomfortable (in other words move you out of your comfort zone) they probably aren’t big enough.
Here’s the thing. If you stay within your comfort zone you’ll just end up doing the same old thing, and will end up getting the same old results.
Setting big, scary, uncomfortable goals ensures that you’ll do things differently, and so get different results. And that’s what we want (and need). Different, life changing results!
Number 5 – Set goals that force you to grow, both technically and as a person.
I truly believe in continuous growth, both technically and in terms of mindset (in other words, as a person).
The more you grow, the more you’ll be able to achieve, the easier you’ll find it to overcome bigger problems (which is a key part of succeeding, no one has “problem free” success) and you’ll get better results.
This will create a positive feedback-loop which will feed your self-belief and produce a virtuous cycle of getting better at doing what you are doing, doing bigger and better things, getting bigger and better results, and increasing further your self-belief.
You’ll become unstoppable! And very, very successful.
So, again, thinking of this in a property context, what do you need to do to be successful in property investing, and how good at it are you? How much do you need to improve? How do you plan to improve?
For example, let’s say that a simple investing process is to find properties, finance them, and then to let and to management them. In practice there’s a lot more to successful property investing than this, and each of these steps can be broken down further into numerous sub-steps. But let’s keep this simple for illustration purposes, and leave the detail for another day.
So how good are you at finding property? How good are you at raising finance? How much do you know about finance and the different options available to you? How good are you at letting and managing property? How much do you know about the technical and legal aspects of letting and managing property?
How would you rate yourself in each of these areas? Do you consider yourself, for example, to be a 5 or a 6 out of 10? In which case, how can you improve to become a 10 out of 10?
We need to be planning for, and working towards, becoming a 10 out of 10 in each of our activities.
Number 6 – Recognise that achieving your goals isn’t a solo activity
However, moving on from the last point, here is another proviso.
All this talk about belief, goals and growth can seem a little daunting if we see success as being “all down to us” and our efforts.
Now, of course it’s up to us to orchestrate our success, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we have to do it all on our own.
So it might be totally appropriate that you do work towards becoming a 10 out of 10 in some of your activities but you may equally feel it is a better use of your time to engage the help or services of someone else who is already a 10 out of 10, and to use their experience and expertise to cover your lack of knowledge and expertise.
That’s called leveraging, or outsourcing, and is one of the key ways you’ll be able to grow your business.
One of the real “secrets” to success is to not to try and do it all on your own. Instead, we need to build a team to take a lot of the donkey work from us, so that we can concentrate on doing the important stuff at a strategic level.
We all have limited time and, to an extent time is the only asset we have which we can really control, so we want to use it as effectively and efficiently as possible.
So have a look at your goals, and work out how you are going to achieve them.
In other words, make a plan, and then look at who can help you achieve your goals quickly and efficiently. This might mean identifying specific people you already know and who have the right skills or, if you don’t know people with the right skills, you will need to plan to find them.
In the next and final post we’ll have a quick look at the last three steps of the process, making a plan, taking action and reviewing progress.
Here’s to successful property investing
Peter Jones
Peter Jones B.Sc FRICS
Chartered Surveyor, author and property investor
